Transparent Lateral Boundary Conditions for HIRLAM. The final shallow water tests and a first multi-level implementation.

A McDonald
Met Éireann
Dublin, Ireland.

(Manuscript received 23 October 2003, in final form 2 February 2004.)


Abstract


First, some remaining issues concerning transparent boundary conditions for the shallow water equations are addressed. (a) What is the correct discretization when the advection velocity is greater than the gravity wave speed? (b) Will the introduction of orographic features on the boundary create instabilities? (c) Can horizontal diffusion be incorporated without generating numerical boundary layers? Second, having answered these questions satisfactorily, the simplest transparent boundary conditions, characteristic boundaries are incorporated into a multi-level model. A 48h forecast is found to be stable and accurate.